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Book Reviews (And Another Free ARC)

No matter how much time we spend living inside our own heads, no matter how hard we work to develop thick skin, no matter how dedicated we are to our own artistic vision…the most important thing in the world to a professional writer is someone else’s opinion.

I’ve recently published an incomplete list of the ways you can support your favorite writer, but the most important far are the three I mention at the top of my Books page here:

If you’ve enjoyed any of my books, please leave a review. It makes more of a difference than you might imagine. One of the biggest things you can do to support me as a writer (right after “Buying my books” and “Recommending them to your friends”) is leaving a review at Amazon.com.

Published book reviews are a phenomenally powerful marketing tool whether they’re in a national paper, a book review blog, or just customer comments at Amazon. And reader recommendations (also known as “word of mouth”) are an even more powerful force.

Harnessing those forces can be a huge challenge. I’ve tried to spark a fire with my recent offer of Advance Reading Copies for my upcoming novel, and as you can see I’ve now blogged on two separate sites and posted a personal plea on one my Books page begging readers for review.

At my publisher’s site, we’ve just posted a standing request for reliable book reviews. That’s right: Consortium Books is willing to give away free copies of every book they publish to any applicants who can prove themselves to be reliable reviewers. That’s how important reviews are.

And today I want to share one with you. It’s for an upcoming novel by my friend and fellow Consortium Writer, Courtney Cantrell. Next Tuesday, the same day we’re releasing The Dragonprince’s Heir, Consortium Books will also be releasing the first book in Courtney’s epic fantasy series, Schism’s Daughter (Legends of the Light-Walkers, #1).

Schism’s Daughter is incredible. You’re going to love it. I read the book years ago, and it was a lot of the reason I came back to fantasy writing. If it hadn’t been for Courtney showing me what real fantasy could be like–rich, grown-up, exciting, and moving–the Dragonprince Trilogy might never have seen the light of day.

If you like epic fantasy, you will love this book. If you like anything you’ve read by me, this book is even better. Courtney Cantrell has a special kind of magic when it comes to high fantasy, and she has worked wonders here.

Read this book. You’ll be glad you did.

I love this book, and I want to see it succeed. I also love my fans who showed up in such great numbers to request a review copy of The Dragonprince’s Heir, so I told Courtney I’d send you guys her way if she would share a copy of Schism’s Daughter with you.

She agreed, and it’s the same offer I made: The first 100 people to leave a comment with a valid email address get free ARCs. So pop over to Courtney’s blog before the end of the day today and get a sneak peek at the next great epic fantasy from Consortium Books.

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Ask Me Anything

I’ve never been a regular at Reddit, but I have friends who are and they’ve been encouraging me for a while to do an AMA (Ask Me Anything) thread.

It’s a little scary, but that’s how I plan to spend my work day today. Swing by if you get a chance.

You might want to keep an eye out for spoilers while you’re there, if you’re that sort of reader. I’ve asked anyone who asks spoiler-y questions to mark the question that way so you can skip it, but for my part I’m entirely willing to talk unwritten plot.

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Fanmail

My final editorial review of The Dragonprince’s Heir is done. I finished it around 10:00 last night, then sat up for another hour tweaking the custom metadata file we use to turn a Google Doc into an actual e-book. Then I wrote a little personal letter to tuck inside the back of the book, ran BookMaker, and mailed out copies to a couple hundred people.

My name is Taryn Eliade, firstborn son of Daven Carrickson. I’ve been called a nuisance and a little lord, a kingsman and a traitor. I’ve been called the dragon-born son and the heritage of Chaos. I was born the Dragonprince’s heir. In the summer of my fourteenth year, at the waning of the dragonswarm, I went on a quest to choose my destiny.

When I woke up this morning, I already had answers. Nobody had sat up all night to finish the book (or if they did, they were too tired to email me), but I had lots of gracious “thank yous.” Those weren’t at all necessary (as I’ll explain below), but they started my day bright.

I also had one fan who’d caught a typo. He was terribly friendly about it, and I was grateful for the heads-up. (It’s already fixed in the source document. Digital bookmaking is a wonderful thing.)

Anyway, as I was making that correction, I glanced down the page and saw this little exchange:

“Those are dangerous words,” I hissed.

Jen’s eyes glittered like a viper’s. “Less dangerous than yours. I only insulted a king. You insulted Caleb Drake.”

(That link isn’t in the actual ebook, it just seemed appropriate here.)

I know it’s not cool to be impressed at your own writing, but when I saw those lines I fell in love with Jen all over again. She’s a relatively minor character in the book, but (for me anyway) she stole the show.

It’s been an interesting week. I’ve split my time between sending out fanmail to people I respect in the desperate hopes of making a connection so I might generate some real publicity for the KickStarter campaign (in its last week, and not even 20% funded), and checking my email for the WordPress comment notifications which, by and large, read like fanmail sent to me!

That still blows my mind. I know a lot of people are buying the books (I check the sales reports obsessively), and I have a lot of followers at Facebook and some wonderful reviews at Amazon. But it still comes as a shock when someone takes the time to contact me directly, especially if it’s to say my books robbed them of sleep or inspired their imagination or left them wanting more.

Those are the things I live for as a reader, and it’s almost unbelievable that I’m getting to have that impact as a storyteller now. You’d be surprised how much time I spend just smiling at my computer monitor.

So, last Saturday I posted saying, “Leave a comment if you want an Advance Reading Copy of The Dragonprince’s Heir.” That was a shrewd, soulless, calculated business tactic. Positive reviews (especially at Amazon) directly and measurably impact how many people hear about the book and end up reading it. When I offer ARCs, I’m doing it as a greedy corporate mogul, to drive the machine of business. Or something.

And your response to that offer left me speechless. For four straight days, I got a constant string of comment notifications from Amazon. It’s like I posted a blog saying,

“Make me feel good about myself!”

And the internet obeyed.

I just wanted to take a moment to express my thanks to all of you. It’s because of my readers that I get to be a storyteller, and that has been my biggest dream my entire life. Thanks for reading, thanks for visiting the site, thanks for recommending the books and posting reviews and leaving comments and sending fanmail. Every bit of that is amazing.

Most of all, thanks for liking me. I like you, too.

Sincerely,
Aaron Pogue

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While You’re Waiting….

Good news! We’ve got an official release date now for The Dragonprince’s Heir (The Dragonprince Trilogy, #3). From my publisher, Consortium Books:

We plan to release The Dragonprince’s Heir on Tuesday, June 26th, along with the debut epic fantasy Schism by Courtney Cantrell.

That’s just two weeks away! Some of you have already applied for Advance Reading Copies of the book, but the rest won’t have long to wait.

In the meantime, here are a few things you could do to help support my writing and your own entertainment:

Contribute to the Kickstarter campaign

There’s only a few days left on the KickStarter campaign, but it’s an opportunity for you to support a good cause and pre-order your personalized e-book or signed first-edition paperback.

Check it out, and spread the word!

Review My Books

If you’ve enjoyed any of my books, please leave a review. It makes more of a difference than you might imagine. One of the biggest things you can do to support me as a writer (right after “Buying my books” and “Recommending them to your friends”) is leaving a review at Amazon.com.

Find more stories to love

Some of you have mentioned how desperate you are for new reading material. Maybe that’s just a cynical bid for extra consideration when it comes to getting an Advance Reading Copy of The Dragonprince’s Heir, but I’m going to take those comments at face value and offer you the recommendations I can:

More Stories from the World of the FirstKing

I have two other short stories related (if obliquely) to the cataclysmic dragonswarms that underpin the Dragonprince Trilogy.

I also have another short story from the same universe, focusing on a different era altogether (and a whole new magic system). Grab a copy of the first issue of our anthology, A Consortium of Worlds, and look for “The Bloodshield Betrayal.”

Superhero Fantasy from the World of Auric

If you’ve already read all the dragonswarm stuff, I’ve got another whole universe of fantasy to offer. The World of Auric features a brand new genre, “superhero fantasy,” where larger-than-life adventurers battle sinister supervillains in a setting that is pure, epic fantasy.

If those two short stories seem like a cruel tease, you’ll be glad to know I’ve got a feature-length novel under development (Oberon’s Dreams), and we’ve specced out at least three epic trilogies featuring these heroes.

Ghost Targets

And if you’re willing to venture outside the realms of epic fantasy, I’ve got a whole trove of other stories to share with you. The Ghost Targets series features a near future dominated by total universal surveillance…and the FBI team dedicated to tracking down those people rich or powerful enough to escape the attention of the database archive.

That series will eventually run to 25 books, but those four should be enough to keep you busy until The Dragonprince’s Heir comes out. I’m awfully proud of them.

Other Consortium Authors

If you’ve already read everything I have to offer, you can still discover other up-and-coming stars by checking out any of the other writers published through Consortium Books.

The easiest (and cheapest) way to do that is to pick up an issue of our short story anthology, where you’ll find stories from a half a dozen different writers for just $2.99.

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Advance Reading Copy of The Dragonprince’s Heir!

For several weeks now (primarily at my Facebook page) I’ve been promising to provide some some Advance Reading Copies of The Dragonprince’s Heir (The Dragonprince Trilogy, #3) to my fans. As you may know, that effort has been delayed a little bit, but I think I’m finally ready to follow through.

I’d like to allow everyone a little time to make their requests (which will also give me time to finish this round of edits and build the files I’ll need to send out). So if you’re interested, leave a comment (with a valid email address) on this post before the end of the day Tuesday, June 12th. If you don’t know what to say, “Me too, please!” will probably do the job. It’s not an essay contest.

I only have digital copies available, but they should be readable on whatever you’re using to read this blog post. On Wednesday, I’ll send review copies to the first hundred people who commented below. All I’d ask in return is that you write me a review at the digital vendor(s) of your choice. Blog posts are welcome too, of course.

Please note that this is a separate offer from the one we made at KickStarter, but everyone who made a pledge there before the end of the day on May 31st should also be getting their ARCs this Wednesday.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, definitely check out our KickStarter campaign! It’s a good cause, and it’s an easy way to pre-order a signed first edition of the paperback.

Update from the Comments

Congratulations to everyone on the list so far! You’ll be hearing back from me on Wednesday. And, of course, there’s still room for more!

I just wanted to pop in and respond to those of you who’ve mentioned how desperate you are for an ARC because you’re all out of reading material. At the risk of sounding like some soulless salesperson, I should mention that I do have some other stories available.

Maybe you’ve already read them all. If so, I can still introduce you to some great new writers. You can’t go wrong with anyone from Consortium Books.

Update from the 100th Responder

We just got our 100th request! Sorry to anyone who missed out, but you’ll only be waiting a couple weeks. The book will be available through Amazon and Barnes & Noble by Tuesday, June 26th.

Can’t wait to hear what you all think! Thanks for the enthusiastic response!

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Contribute to Our KickStarter Campaign and Secure Your ARC of Dragonprince #3!

I’ve been talking a lot about this KickStarter campaign lately, and I’ll probably keep on doing it for the next two or three weeks. We’ve got a lot hanging on this campaign.

For one, it’s the only way I get paid for The Dragonprince’s Heir. I’ve already donated the proceeds of the book to the Consortium, so a successful KickStarter campaign is the only way this book is going to help me pay off my newest student loans.

Don’t feel sorry for me. I made the decision to donate those proceeds, and I’m doing just fine financially. Still, I wouldn’t pass up the chance to roll around in a pile of money.

The real reason this campaign is so important to me, is that it offers the opportunity to get a lot of public attention on what we’re doing here. If we can actually raise $30,000 in patronage funding for a book project, we’ll end up with a story in USA Today. Maybe I’ll get to talk to Jon Stewart. Could be fun.

Anyway! I’ve been getting a lot of requests for details about the promised Advance Reading Copy of The Dragonprince’s Heir. For those of you still wondering, no, I haven’t yet announced the requirements (or schedule) for it here. I wanted to do that this week, but it looks like it’ll be early next week instead.

However, as part of the KickStarter campaign, we’ve promised to give ARCs to everyone who makes a pledge (starting as low as $1) by the end of the day today. It’s also a handy way to pre-order a signed copy of the paperback, which isn’t something we usually offer.

So even if all you want is more dragonswarm, this KickStarter has something to offer you. If you really like my work (and want to see more like it), please support the company that pays me to write. It’s a good cause.

But with that said, please don’t feel like a contribution is required to get an ARC. It’s just a perk the Consortium is offering. That’s something else altogether.

I’ll still have a post early next week, as promised, explaining when and where and how to get an ARC, no purchase necessary. I just need to do some really frantic revisions first. But that’s what Saturdays are for, right?

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The Quest for a New Patronage

My Director of Marketing helped me come up with this tonight. He’s a useful man to know, I’ll say that much.

There are a few things you can count on in fantasy novels: The hero is brave and strong, he always beats the monster, every quest is an adventure, and magic is a useful tool for changing the world.

Unfortunately, reality isn’t always as reliable. The hero might just be an author. The monster might be a stupid and dangerous system propped up by the rich and powerful. The quest might be to get a master work of art into the hands of those who can enjoy it.

But magic…magic is always a useful tool for changing the world. And art is magic. It’s magic you can take part in whether you’re a lover of the arts or a creator yourself.

You may not be able to conjure living fire or will yourself halfway around the world, but you still have the power to battle an evil monster that devours the free expression of art. That monster is called copyright. Together we can beat it, and fill the world with a magic only art can bring.

Please visit this link to see how. Stand with us, hero.

That’s going in the back of Taming Fire and The Dragonswarm for the next couple weeks. Think it’ll spark some interest?

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Sneak Peek Blog Tour: Becca J. Campbell

It’s been a while since I’ve made time for anything but work. At the beginning of the year, that work was my day job. I put aside everything–homework, recreation, family…even my writing and publishing–because I knew how close my goal was. For two months, I buried myself in the day job just so I could crawl back out of it forever at the end of February.

But, as I’ve chronicled here, the end of one frenzy brought the beginning of another. I went from finishing up my day job to finishing up my Master’s degree. For another two months, I was desperately busy doing nothing but writing.

Everything got a whole lot better once I put on the cap and gown and walked away from the schoolwork…except, of course, I now had four months of neglect to make up for.

So now it’s time for recreation and family (not to mention my own writing and publishing). That all came together last week when I finally got the chance to dive into the newest novel from Consortium Books, Foreign Identity by Becca J. Campbell.

Foreign Identity is a light sci-fi puzzler. If I had to categorize it, I might call it romantic suspense. It’s Lost and The Truman Show rolled up in one. It’s a strange world, a living mystery, and two very ordinary people caught up in an unbelievable mystery.

The science fiction and mystery elements keep the story moving, but the real power of the book is entirely in the relationship between the protagonists, the conflict of true character, and the painful struggle to find a companion when you really, really need one.

It’s brilliant. It’s exciting fun trapped in the microcosm of two frightened people all alone. It’s a story well worth reading.

And since I’m lucky enough to be friends with the author, I get to participate in her Sneak Peek Blog Tour. That mainly means that you get a chance to win the book from me! Becca’s set up a Rafflecopter giveaway, and you can win a free copy of the book by signing up below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

For more chances to win, check out the other stops on board Becca’s Sneak Peek Blog Tour:

You can also learn more about Becca and get your own copy by visiting the Foreign Identity product page at Consortium Books.

Go there. Get a copy. Read it for fun. I did it for work, but that’s just because I have an amazing job. This was some of the most enjoyable reading I’ve done in a while. Now I’m off to do a little more. Later!

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Remnant (A Dragonswarm Short Story)

Some of you may have already seen it in A Consortium of Worlds, #2, but I’ve just released a new dragonswarm short story. Set thousands of years before the events of the Dragonprince Trilogy, “Remnant” tells the story of what happened last time the dragons woke.

You can pick up a copy of the short story for $0.99, or get it with a handful of others for just $2.99 in the anthology. It’s a good deal either way.

But you don’t have to take my word for it. Here’s a taste of the story:

Rinuld stood deep in the afternoon shadows, nearly invisible among the summer-scorched pines, and thought, What a waste of a perfectly good virgin. He chewed a short strip of bark, more for distraction than for the deadening effect. Otherwise he didn’t move. He made no sound. He only watched.

She was dressed in rags, of course. No sense sending her to die in clothes that still had another year’s wear in ‘em. They hadn’t skimped on the chains, though. Those were iron links solid enough to restrain a raging bear, binding a girl who couldn’t have seen more than seventeen summers. The cuffs on her wrists and the collar at her neck were so heavy they’d long since dragged her to her knees. She slumped against the scarred cliff face, trembling from time to time, but she made no effort to escape.

The cliff face troubled him. It was dead center on the east wall of the valley, situated to catch the dying sunset rays. There was a section of it scraped bare. Six paces tall and almost exactly as wide, flat and square as a townhouse wall. Man-made. It had been smooth, too. Once. Now it was scarred with long, fierce gouges–living granite torn like paper by razor-sharp talons. Soft gray stone stained black with soot and blood.

And anchors made of steel. Not bronze, not cold-wrought iron, but honest steel. A fortune in perfect steel. Five posts of it, driven deep into the stone, and from those anchors ran five iron chains to bind the skinny, pale girl.

Rinuld knew what came next. It would happen at sunset. Teeth like sickle blades would shear through her wrist-thick bonds of iron. A stomach like a furnace would consume the heavy shackles and the tender flesh alike. A pretty little girl would die, and some stupid primitive tribesmen down on the hillside would think themselves safer for another week. Another month. They couldn’t hope for a season.

And perhaps they would be. Perhaps the beast would overlook the tribe that had left the girl in chains. The monsters certainly loved treasures, and there was not much rarer now, not much more precious than human lives.

He’d seen the offer made before, but no one had survived. Not long. He’d met a thousand tribes in a hundred different lands. He’d seen villages and cavehomes. He’d met heathens and hunters and cowards who hid. It didn’t really seem to make much difference. He’d seen every effort to survive, every deal man had made with the harbingers of cataclysm, and none of it had worked.

The Twin Empires had not survived against the beasts. All the Warlord’s armies had barely held the swarm at bay. What hope was there for a dozen dirty tribesmen with nothing more to throw against them than a chained-up, beaten-down little girl?

If you’re wondering what happens next, I’ll give you a hint: Rinuld decides against his better judgment to rescue her. It’s gloriously brutal.

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Nearly There!

On Friday, I dropped in to explain with great fear and trembling that I would have just three days to write 20,000 words.

I sort of exaggerated the dilemma, because I was only counting Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. I left on Friday and Saturday, because I was heading to Arkansas for those two days to visit with my family there (and give a little talk on self-publishing to the Fiction Writers of Central Arkansas association).

That trip gave me six hours in the car both ways, and of course while I was in Arkansas–even with birthday parties and fancy dinners and writers’ associations–I had some time to myself. I should have called it five days, not three.

But, then, I know myself. With less than a week to write 20,000 words, I still only managed 2,000 words on Friday and Saturday. So, pretty much as anticipated, I showed up to work Sunday morning with 18,000 words to write in three days.

That was more than a little terrifying. I stared at my laptop in panic. I double-checked my word count (it hadn’t changed). I skimmed back through the last couple pages, hoping to ride some narrative momentum straight into a productive day of writing.

I went to get a cup of coffee.

I sat back down at the laptop, went through the whole process again, and went to get another cup of coffee.

Nothing was happening. I went for a walk around the empty office. Not a casual stroll–an aggressive, angry power-walk to get the blood pumping. I put in a good half hour, then came back to my laptop, opened the story, and just stared.

Finally I gave up. I went to Facebook and quipped. I went to Twitter and caught up on industry news and clever misattributed quotes. I did some administrative cleanup at all my many blogs.

Oh, hey! You can now email me from the handy-dandy Contact form!

And then–four hours in, utterly broken, and deeply ashamed of myself that I couldn’t even write one word, let alone 18,000–I went slinking back to my Google Docs.

But instead of opening the treacherous story tab (“GT: Faith – Editing Copy”), I opened the one next to it (“Prewriting Package for Ghost Targets: Faith”). I scrolled down to the plot outline/scene list and stared at a bunch of empty spots or brief, one-line descriptions. I frowned at one of those, shifted it down a spot, and fleshed it out.

Then I added a scene above it, to describe the one I was currently working on. And that generated a new scene, which bumped the one below it even further down. Then I skipped past that one and added a new scene after. I spent more than a hour adding fewer than 500 words.

And when I was done, I had a story to tell. I clicked over to the story tab, and started writing. By the time I went home last night (early enough to watch some TV with the wife and get a full night’s sleep), I’d written 8,000 words.

One day gone. Two days left, and 10,000 words yet to write. That’s still triple the daily output necessary to win NaNoWriMo, but hey, I did 8,000 yesterday. I think I can manage it.

Now I’m off to give it a try.